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  • Published: 1 October 1999
  • ISBN: 9781101173787
  • Imprint: PEN US eBook Adult
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 368

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Stories





Before the fall premiere of the new television series, read the original legend of Ichabod Crane, the Headless Horseman, and the singularly spooky town of Sleepy Hollow in Washington Irving's classic book

When Washington Irving first published this collection of essays, sketches, and tales—originally entitled The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.—readers greeted it with enthusiasm, and Irving emerged as America's first successful professional author.

This volume includes "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle," two of America's most recognizable and loved works of fiction and displays Irving's ability to depict American landscapes and culture so vividly that readers feel themselves a part of them. And it is on the basis of these two classic tales that Irving is generally credited with inventing the short story as a distinct literary genre. Also included here are gently ironic pieces about life in England that reflect the author's interest in the traditions of the Old World and his longings for his home in the New.

  • Published: 1 October 1999
  • ISBN: 9781101173787
  • Imprint: PEN US eBook Adult
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 368

Other books in the series

Emma
Persuasion
The Black Tulip
The Lady of the Camellias
On Sparta
Love
Annals
Military Dispatches

About the author

Washington Irving

Washington Irving (1783 – 1859) was born into a rich New York family, the youngest of eleven children. He was named after the great future American President, George Washington. Young Washington's early education was patchy but he developed an early love for books and writing. As an adult he didn't have to worry about earning a living and after practising law for a few years he began to write for newspapers and magazines. His first book, Knickerbocker's History of New York (1809), was the first American humorous book which was also literature. It was a great success but Irving continued to be only a part-time writer.

In 1815 he moved to London to manage the British end of the family business and stayed for seventeen years. When the family business collapsed in 1817, He had to make a living for the first time. The immediate result was The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent which contained his two most famous fantasy stories, Rip van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. These classic stories have kept Washington Irving's name alive. He is often called 'the father of American literature' because of the charm and style of his writing and because he was always breaking new ground.

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